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Fernando Alonso says Sebastian Vettel can still be caught in F1 points chase

June 27, 2013

Fernando Alonso, shown here at Silverstone practicing on Friday for Sunday's British Grand Prix, is second in the Formula One points chase. Photo by LAT PHOTOGRAPHIC

Fernando Alonso says there is still plenty of time to close the gap with championship leader Sebastian Vettel

, but concedes that he cannot afford to lose any more points to mistakes.

"All races are important from now on, especially in the position we are in," said Alonso. "Thirty-six points behind the leader, we don't have much more room to do mistakes or lose many more points. But, on the other side, we need to remain calm, we need to do our job, the maximum we can every weekend.

"If we can win the race, if we can finish in front of Sebastian, it will be great. If we cannot do it, we will try to lose the minimum points. Last year after Monza I think I had an advantage of around 40 points [39] over Sebastian and it was not enough -- and that was Monza time. So now being in the race for the championship 36 points behind -- it's not the ideal position but it's not the end of the world."

Alonso reiterated that Vettel has not had any bad luck so far this year, implying that he is due some.

"I think he's doing a fantastic job. I think he's been nearly perfect in all the races with no negative races, always performing well in qualifying and doing very good races. Obviously I had two unlucky situations, one in Malaysia, one in Bahrain. Kimi [Räikkönen] was leading the championship or very close until he had two unlucky situations: one in Monaco and in Canada was a little bit of a mixed race for him.

"So we need to keep fighting, we need to keep pushing and we need to recover from these bad races that we had now. As Lewis [Hamilton] said before, I think Red Bull is performing really well. It's improving compared to the first part of the championship, so we really need to raise our game if we want to catch Sebastian because he's doing a fantastic job."

Alonso expects the Ferrari to be competitive at Silverstone. "I think it should be a good circuit for us,” he said. “We've been more or less competitive here for the last three or four years. It is the first circuit that is a little bit similar to China and Barcelona -- the best circuits so far for this year's car and we have some high hopes for this weekend.

"On the other hand, Red Bull has been quite strong, and dominant here from 2009. So it will be an extremely close and challenging weekend with Mercedes I'm sure very, very strong as well, as they proved in China and in Barcelona with the first row in qualifying etcetera. So, an interesting weekend ahead of us but we approach it with confidence, knowing that we have a good opportunity."